The
lake was round and silent, like a great Cyclops eye, the moon's
reflection its attentive pupil. Fronds and blades of foliage hung
over the banks like multitudes of emerald eyelashes.

Though
it was cold, and frost tipped almost every place, the water had been
spared of ice. This was a blessing for the creatures that dwelt in
its depths, or the ones that thirsted for it.

This
winter was a harsh one. Those animals which hibernated into a dry den
where they could wake, refreshed in the spring were lucky. The deer
that gathered in the woodlands bunched together in masses to conserve
what little warmth they owned. The birds that had not migrated to
warmer lands ceased to sing, as if the bitter, clawed wind would
snatch their voices away in an instant.

Even
the moon seemed to shiver, cowering behind clouds that drifted numbly
across the black, star-scattered sky. But at least the moon could
still share some of its light with the earth, and it was the ghostly
rays it sent downwards that illuminated plumes of icy breath being
expelled by an animal that trotted languidly towards the lake.

The
animal snorted in distaste, shaking its head to scatter the dampness
collecting in its haywire mane. It reached the lake edge, plants
lashing at its gangly legs. It lowered its head to drink the water,
and the iciness of the liquid hammered down its throat. It recoiled
sharply, unused to the cruel temperature. Panting heavily, it stared
at the rolling surface of the lake: a bewildered horse face met its
gaze. The horse stood there, seeing what it had become. Its eyes were
sunken and had lost their stubborn glimmer. The mane that had once
swum with elegance in the balmy breeze, like wisps of silk, had
turned coarse and stiff. Its ears, once high and pricked, ready to
register and evaluate the slightest sound, had sagged low; as if the
horse had heard everything it needed to hear and no longer had need
of them. Deep welts down its withered face showed the injury of a
bridle too tightly strapped.

It
was this lonely face that revealed in an instant that the spirit
within, once bursting with life, had been beaten down, bruised almost
till it shattered. This fiery creature, a bold testimony to the
wonders of aliveness, had turned cold with the roughness and cruelty
of another race of animals. It was a bitter thing to see, this
ruptured spirit.

The
horse had finished its powerful, slamming drink. Slowly it paced away
a short distance from the bank and collapsed onto the wet, muddy
ground. It whinnied softly in self pity, knowing that there was no
one to hear it anyway. Despondently it arranged itself as comfortably
as possible, resting on its legs. It issued a final, quiet rumble
before lowering its head and drifting into a light, peaceful slumber,
serenaded by a distant owl's calling, and watched over by a million
glowing stars. Once still, the darkness swallowed it up and the
figure joined an army of motionless things, alive and lifeless, that
froze in the cold wind and might never stir again.

The
horse, lulled by numbness, travelled into sleep briskly. Its dreams
were far kinder than what reality gave. A world away from the raking
wind and the cold, cold atmosphere, the horse was free to gallop with
muscled legs that sluiced through long, silken grass and soft air. A
thousand times the ground was pounded with hooves that knew how to
carry, and in turn the sun pounded down upon the horse's back. The
animal, enlivened with the freedom it had lost before, tossed its
head proudly, its mane flying. The glint of an unbroken spirit
returned to the fiery eyes that burned with passion. New wind swept
past its graceful body, but this wind was cool and welcoming. Above
all the things that the animal experienced, it was the warmth that
was the greatest entity of all: a relentless sun that clouds dared
not obscure shared every inch of its rays, and the wind could be like
soft, harmless flames as well as brushes of coolness. Yes, this
atmosphere was far kinder than the one left behind.

It
then ceased its galloping, its body riddled with streams of sweat.
Before the horse lay a land untouched by any but its own kind, and
indeed there was kin that grazed sedately on the plains, carefree but
never taking for granted the wonderful freedom bestowed upon them.

The
horse neighed with joy, for it had lost the memory of its old home
long ago. Everything, the sights, the smells, the feel of this
world was beautiful, and memories, rusty but untainted, rushed back.
Swamped with an everlasting glow of happiness, the animal moved to
join its family once more on the plains. But suddenly the sight began
to melt away, sucked into blackness. And in the next moment, the
horse was transported to a later time, the memories of which that
could never be erased from the horses mind. Capture, stolen from
homeland that was all it had ever known. Days and days of trekking
behind creatures that rode on its kind, but had been strangely broken
so that they bore the thieves willingly. The horse tried to escape,
tried to break free of the leather thongs strapped round its head.
The struggling came to no avail, and the animal was all but exhausted
by the time the salty tang of the sea reached its nostrils and the
ocean, a torrent of white, frothing waves clashing against each other
in a ceaseless battle, fought before it. And, as terrified as the
horse was by this alien world, it was led by force onto a huge,
creaking galleon of wood. For many months the animal lived in a dim,
musty stall inside the bowels of this strange edifice that at times
rocked violently and produced agonising groaning sounds. It was cold
here, and the salty wind always managed to worm through chinks and
open trapdoors. Other horses lived, restrained, in the stalls as
well, whinnying in fright and panic, issuing sharp braying sounds
whenever their calmness left them completely. Sometimes one of them
would fall ill, lying in their cramped space and unable to do more,
until one of the strange creatures that had brought them here noticed
and took the animal away. Those that fell sick were never seen again,
and there was a foreboding chill behind that knowledge that made the
other horses hope that they could avoid illness.

The
horse that missed its home so much, and was so unused to this new
place, managed to stave off panic and illness. Its resilience was
rewarded after months of living solely in a dim hovel, when the
continuous rocking stopped, and finally the horse was led from the
galleon and breathed fresh, land air once more. But its journey was
not over yet. It was taken, with the others who had survived the sea
voyage, away from the place where the galleon was docked and through
huge towns of the strange creatures, along both cobble and dirt
roads. It was perhaps a month later that they appeared to be stopping
at last, at a small settlement. The horse and its companions,
exhausted to an even greater extent after the trek, were allowed one
blissful night in a stable of dry hay and thick, stone walls that
didn't shudder and shake. It was the first decent night the horse
had had since all those months before when it'd been captured.

The
next morning, when mist clung to the sodden ground and the sun was
too weak to provide any warmth, the horse was led to wide expanse of
bare ground, the perimeter fenced. It was here that the animal smelt
the stench of defeat; spirits that had been wasted and beaten. It saw
the whips held in the creatures hands, long canes that it already
sensed were for the purpose of forceful discipline. It was here that
the horse released the panic and outrage that had built up inside it
for all these months, and broke free from the firm grip of a captor.
With pumping muscles that fed off final reserves of strength, it
jumped the fence and galloped as fast as was allowed after the toils
of the treks. Behind it were the shouts of the creatures, enraged by
its sudden escape. It was these sounds that fuelled the horse's
longing for a freedom it had long forgotten. It galloped for miles
across muddy countryside, but as fatigue came as a poison in its
limbs, it slowed to a subdued canter. It looked uneasily around the
land; it was not used to the clumpy grass, the constant damp smell
around the air, and the bare trees that the frail sunlight threaded
through. And the cold was as bad as it had been on the sea voyage.
Shivers swept along the horse's body, and it had ceased to sweat.
Its nostrils continued to expel white steam. Its only consolation was
that it had managed to pull off the choking bridle previously
strapped round its head. A loose thong had made that possible.

The
animal slowly made its way across the countryside, each step carrying
it further from the place where its spirit had come so close to
breaking. It had two thoughts in its mind, and though one was right,
the animal forced itself to trust the other: one was that it would
find its way home if it kept walking in one direction, but the other,
the right one, recalled the sea voyage and knew that returning home
was impossible. Nevertheless, the horse persisted, ignoring the
aching of its limbs and the froth round its mouth. The sun began to
fall behind the rolling hills that the horse had come upon, and
nightfall descended. Darkness crept across the atmosphere and soon
the horse used moonlight as a guide.

And
so it was, beside the Cyclops lake, that the memories became a dream
again, and the horse, motionless in its slumber, continued to dream
of distant lands that were mere images in its mind; it could no
longer remember the feel of that world.

The
frost slunk higher with icy fingers, and dampness began to settle on
the horse's back. Nothing, not even the animal itself, could sense
the failing, slowing heartbeat. The wind clawed and scratched and
raked at it, dragging the cold through its fur. The iciness of the
atmosphere weighed down on it, spreading like a chilly blanket that
offered no shelter. The final remnants of warmth within the horse's
body flickered as a dying flame would, and gradually the heat was
sucked away. It was here, in the damp grass, beside an icy lake, that
the horse's body gently convulsed once, and the heartbeat that had
been beating ever since the animal came into the world halted for a
final time. Peacefully, the horse slipped into an eternal oblivion
far from coldness. And it remained still and rigid till the morning,
when a farmer's boy, rubbing his hands together to generate heat,
approached the lake and found the body with a shock. He paced
cautiously up to it, wary of sudden movement, but the motionlessness
stayed. As he knelt on the wet grass to peer at the frozen horse's
face, he felt his own tears forming. The expression the animal wore
was a one of calmness and a distant joy. The fiery soul had left its
glassy eyes, but it was clear where it had gone. The horse was in a
far away land, where once more it raced the wind and tossed its head,
eyes seeking the bright orb of the sun that gazed down proudly on it.
It galloped across the hills with undying energy, and alongside it
were others of its kind. The herd pounded across the plains, their
manes flaming with sunlight, and the horse that had endured so much
pain, so much exhaustion, and so much coldness led them. It led them
on a never ending journey across plains of silken grass, soft wind
that stroked their glossy fur and a sun as their God that spread the
warmth of the world around them. The horse was free, like a bursting
flame of light and heat that would never, ever die.

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